Word of Life Church Podcast

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An Open Life of Endless Possibilities Apr 28, 2017

Show notes

"We are all Thomas now." These words echo throughout our current secular age. Everything is questioned. Everything is doubted. In response to this seemingly dark reality, we can choose to retreat into a closed off life of certainty or open to the endless possibilities of an enchanted world. A world where Christ fills all things. In an age of doubt, we find the doubter's doubt is faith. This sermon explores the tension we feel as people of faith in a secular age.

Flooding the World with Forgiveness Apr 23, 2017

Show notes

Jesus appearing in a locked room, speaking peace, and sending his disciples into the world with a commission to forgive, should speak powerfully to a traumatized post 9-11 church that is afraid, angry, and retreating into ever smaller locked rooms of security obsessed ideologies.

Not Abandoned Apr 21, 2017

Show notes

What’s Happened To You?
The Call
What's happened to you?
You used to be so shy
You used to hang your head down
You wouldn't look in my eyes
Did you some great vision
Did you finally break through
Did you shake the foundations
What's happened to you?
What's happened to you?
You used to look so tired
Now there's a spring in your step
And your words are on fire
Did you hear some great secret
Did the words ring of truth
Did you rise from the ashes
What's happened to you?
Where the four winds meet
The world is so still
The waves are not pounding
And the hungry are filled
Our shadows have crossed here
Where the sun touched the ground
The gathered are singing
what a beautiful sound
What's happened to you?
You used to be so unkind
You used to curse at this poor world
So what changed your mind
What stirred such compassion
Is a mystery to me
I don't know what's happened
Oh, but I like what I see

Why Are You Weeping? Apr 16, 2017

Show notes

Jesus entered into Death by death in order to fill Death with himself; so that now to enter into Death is to encounter Christ.

What Does This Mean? Apr 14, 2017

Show notes

The principalities and powers assert the right to wield violence because they claim to be wise and just. But the crucifixion of Jesus reveals the awful truth, and puts the principalities and powers to shame. We shroud our violence in the myth of justice, but in our violence we are neither wise nor just. What we are, is capable of the greatest crime: the murder of the innocent Son of God. At Golgotha we recoil in horror at our violence and stagger away saying, what have we done? Because even if we are not personal participants in violence, most of us have too often placed our faith in institutions of collective violence. But on Good Friday the truth comes out…and we beat our breasts in sorrow.

Who Is This? Apr 09, 2017

Show notes

Lift up your heads, O gates;
lift them high, O everlasting doors;
and the King of glory shall come in.
“Who is this King of glory?”
“The LORD, strong and mighty,
the LORD, mighty in battle.”
Lift up your heads, O gates;
lift them high, O everlasting doors;
“Who is this King of glory?”
“The LORD of hosts,
he is the King of glory”
(Psalm 24:7–10)

Paradise Found Apr 07, 2017

Show notes

To read the Bible in such a way that's it’s not a sprawling mass of contradictions we have to center our reading at some stationary, unmoving point. That is, we have to find the place to stand in this thousand page epic of redemption where we say, “It's from this vantage point that I’ll read and interpret the rest of Scripture.
It’s not Leviticus with its prohibition against eating shellfish and other obsolete laws.
It’s not Joshua’s conquest of Canaan with its troubling genocidal violence.
It’s not even Paul’s technical theology of justification that we’re so prone to misread and misunderstand.
It’s certainly not the Book of Revelation with its wild (and often inscrutable!) metaphors.
Center your reading of the sacred text in the Gospels…with Jesus…on the cross…as he forgives his murderers. Luke 23:34 ("Father, forgive them") is the Pole Star around which the rest of scriptural constellations rotate and are interpreted.

Lazarus, Raskolnikov, and You Apr 02, 2017

Show notes

The story of Lazarus abides among us as a story of enduring hope despite all odds. When all seems lost, when all hope has faded, we remember the story of Lazarus. Because Jesus is the resurrection and the life, no one — no matter how mired in sin and death, in sorrow and despair — is a lost cause.

Jesus and the Tenth Commandment Mar 31, 2017

Show notes

Economic self-interest is the single greatest obstacle to participating in the kingdom of God.
Jesus doesn’t teach Marxist economics.
Jesus doesn’t teach Capitalist economics.
Jesus teaches Love economics.
We’ve been scripted to believe that life is a competition of acquisition. But that is a lie. Life is not a game; life is a gift. The purpose of life is not to win; the purpose of life is to learn to love well.

For Judgment I Came Mar 26, 2017

Show notes

Jesus has healed the blind man and it was a scandal. There should have been a party, but instead there was an investigation. The Pharisees were all upset about this and they launched a criminal investigation. Jesus shows them what true judgment looks like. To their surprise, it wasn’t fault-finding or pointing the finger of accusation. The judgment of Jesus is not a judgment of condemnation, but a judgment of light, exposing things for what they are in order to set things right.

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